Chapter 192

Thinking this, Zuo Jian around and glanced at the towering cliff behind him. He had just jumped from there, landing hard.

"Well, it's not entirely like what humans should be like." At least, humans can't jump off a cliff and land alive and kicking.

Thinking this, Zuo Jian moved his limbs and then prepared to continue on his way when he suddenly heard the sound of metal clashing.

Is anyone there?

Zuo Jian frowned, then pushed aside the bushes and headed toward the source of the sound.

Soon, as the sounds of collisions grew louder and faster, Zuo Jian found the source of the noise.

They were a brother and sister with similar pink hair, facing several men wielding curved swords... who looked like mercenaries.

"Who?" Seemingly sensing his movement, the pink Sarkaz, who looked like an older brother, was drawn to his bushes. However, the next moment, the mercenary confronting him suddenly released his grip on the knife, then grabbed the hilt and slashed down the other's longsword towards his throat!

"Kid, don't look around during the fight!" The mercenary's pupils were fixed on the other's throat, a bloodthirsty look in his eyes.

"Elder brother!"

The girl standing nearby watched as her brother's throat was about to be slit open by a sharp knife, and she couldn't help but scream.

However, the expected pain did not come the next moment, even after the pink-haired Sarkaz boy had closed his eyes.

He slowly opened his eyes and saw only a strange figure standing in front of him, with the deadly dagger stopped right in front of him.

Zuo Jian gripped the mercenary's wrist as he charged forward, looking at the group of people in front of him with a somewhat indifferent expression.

"... It's really lifelike... I thought the so-called remnants of memory were all static."

Requesting leave! Requesting leave--

Well, although I know that updating once a day is slow and I like to skip certain key parts, it's necessary for developing the plot later on, right? (Probably)

Well, the main reason is that being able to take two days off each month and maintain perfect attendance is just too tempting; I always feel like I'm missing out if I don't take the time off.

Leave requests are indeed a bad habit that encourages laziness!

(I'm taking a break today, goodnight everyone!)

Chapter Twenty-Eight, Little Te and... Little Little Te?

Is it just a remnant of memory?

Zuo Jian looked at the mercenary whose wrist he had grabbed. Faced with the mercenary's struggle, he protected Theresis behind him and then released his grip.

Seeing this, the mercenary immediately retreated a few steps to create distance, while simultaneously leading the police...

His wary gaze was fixed on this "stranger" who had suddenly intruded.

"You're not Sarkaz? That's rare... I've never seen a race other than Sarkaz before." The other person gripped the hilt of the sword backwards, staring intently at the man who showed no racial characteristics.

He rolled his eyes, as if he were pondering something.

Zuo Jian stood silently in place, watching the mercenary who had distanced himself, his expression one of deep thought.

It was so lifelike, almost indistinguishable from a real person. It was completely different from what I had originally predicted—those memory-based NPCs that would simply replicate past events based on existing memories.

It's just like a real person.

Thinking of this, he turned around and glanced at the brother and sister he had just rescued.

The young brother stood in front of his sister, so Zuo Jian could only see the former's wary expression... Was he wary of him? That was understandable.

Moreover— Zuo Jian glanced again at the young Sarkaz's attire; his clothes looked like they had been patched many times, and the sword he held was old and worn out.

"I said..." Zuo Jian turned his head, then raised his hand without even blinking, pinching the tip of the knife, which was filled with intense killing intent, between two fingers.

Even this murderous intent felt so real that it wasn't fake at all.

"What... it was stopped?" The mercenary's pupils widened, seemingly unable to believe that his 'sneak attack,' which he had just used almost all his strength, had been stopped so easily.

He looked at Zuo Jian's unchanging expression and the strength with which he held his curved sword between just two fingers, making it impossible for him to budge.

Without hesitation, he released his grip on the knife and quickly retreated, widening the distance between himself and Zuo Jian.

"* Sarkaz swearing*, who exactly are you?" the mercenary cursed, then stared intently at the man in front of him.

He considered himself to have a good eye; having been a mercenary in Kazdel for so long, he could almost instantly recognize anyone with a bit of skill.

Those guys almost all had something in common: they exuded an extremely dangerous aura. Just one glance was enough to tell how long they had been in this line of work and how much blood they had spilled. Some of them even carried a stronger stench of blood than those damned Bloodfiend.

But... this guy...

Despite appearing almost entirely harmless, the expression on his face was that of one of those idiots who stepped into the mercenary world only to die on the roadside the next day.

But----

"Well, I'm still quite curious, why did you guys target this brother and sister? Mercenaries don't do things that aren't profitable, right? This brother and sister don't seem like people you can easily bully. More importantly, they don't seem to be carrying anything valuable."

Zuo Jian, on the Zuo Jian, looked quite relaxed. While asking the other person questions, he also took the dagger that the guy had left on his fingertip and weighed it in his hand.

"Oh? You didn't know? Looks like you really are a stranger here." The mercenary said to Zuo Jian while putting his hands behind his back, signaling his two companions to prepare their weapons.

"Is it that obvious?" Zuo Jian squinted and gave a helpless smile, then looked at the mercenary, gesturing for him to continue.

"In recent years, a place called Scar Market has gradually emerged. Many mercenaries rely on that place to take on jobs and make a living. You can get a lot of things there, whether it's intelligence, weapons, someone's life, or even..."

The mercenary leader licked his lips and then spoke.

"Slave."

"..."

At this point, he suddenly changed his attitude, forcing a look of regret that he and Zuo Jian had not met sooner.

"Hey buddy, how about this? We don't need to go to such extremes. You can have the guy. He's got a good build and knows a bit of swordsmanship. He'll fetch a good price at the Scar Market."

"As for the woman, you know, most of the time they're just used as sex toys. Although you can negotiate a good price, they don't last long, especially the small ones, they're easy to break. So the price is definitely lower than the man's. I'll take the woman, you take the man, and we'll pretend we didn't see anything..."

He was halfway through his sentence when he realized that Zuo Jian seemed to be completely ignoring them. He turned his back to them and faced the brother and sister. He then bent down and tried to rub the brother's head, before glancing at the sister behind him and speaking.

Theresis initially wanted to dodge, but remembering how easily the other party had deflected the attack of the troublesome mercenary, she realized that she and her sister were completely at a disadvantage against this stranger. So she gritted her teeth and refused to dodge.

Zuo Jian ruffled the other person's pink hair, then asked.

"May I have your name."

"Trey... Sis..."

"Theresis, right? She's your sister, isn't she?"

"What do you want to do?!" The boy who called himself Theresis gripped his sword tightly, staring intently at the powerful stranger.

"You did a good job. As an older brother, this is how you should protect your sister... After all, she's family, isn't she?"

Zuo Jian finished speaking, he stood up and released his hand from rubbing Theresis's hair.

"Now, Theresis, stand in front of your sister and block her from seeing what she's about to see."

"What's the meaning..."

Zuo Jian didn't answer, but then patted the latter on the shoulder, indicating that he should just do as he was told.

Realizing that the other party had not responded to his idea, Theresis hesitated for a moment but still did as he was told. However, his eyes remained fixed on Zuo Jian's figure, as if he was worried that the other party would suddenly attack them at any moment.

"Hey, buddy, isn't that a bit unfair of you? We were here first, and you've already gotten the lion's share, isn't that enough?"

The mercenary stared at Zuo Jian with a troubled expression, but the latter remained silent, fiddling with the scimitar he had captured, seemingly having no desire to answer them.

In response, the former simply waved his hand dismissively, as if to give up.

"Alright, alright, buddy, since that's the case, you can have it. After all, it's your first time in Kazdel, so it's only right that you experience the 'hospitality' of the Sarkaz. Let's go, brothers."

As he spoke, he waved to the other two, signaling them to prepare to leave.

However, in the instant he turned around, his eyes flashed with intense killing intent, and at the same time, through a blind spot, he slowly drew a poisoned dagger from his pocket.

Meanwhile, his two accomplices were also prepared to provide cover. With their help, he was confident he could slit the man's neck again; even if he couldn't, just making a cut...

This is the 'hospitality' of the mercenaries around Kazdel.

That was the moment the two groups collided on the road; they should have both known that only one group could survive.

"Is that so? Since you're planning to leave, then have a safe journey."

In an instant, just as he was about to draw his sword and turn around, Zuo Jian's voice rang in his ears like a ghost, faint and indistinct, and he could even feel the sound of breathing coming from beside him.

"Varied..."

The sharp curved blade severed the blood vessels in his neck, causing a large amount of blood to gush out, meaning his life would be lost rapidly in the next few seconds.

"I'm very sorry, mercenaries. It's truly a pity for you."

"In the end, people like you are not the same as some of the guys I despise. Maybe you've gradually become like this just to make a living. But all I can do right now is to make things a little easier for you."

Zuo Jian spoke, he took the poisoned dagger from his hand with his left hand and drew his curved sword with his right.

Then, with a flick of his wrists, two cold lights swiftly flew from his hands, precisely piercing the throats of the two remaining mercenaries around him, causing them to bleed profusely.

Even though it's just a remnant of memory------

"You... cough cough... what are you planning to do...?"

On a forest path.

The man was carrying a young Sarkaz boy on his back, with an equally young girl beside him.

"If you're injured, talk less, Theresis. Your sister is worried about you."

"That..."

Just then, the girl beside him spoke up, looking at the man.

"Thank you for saving us, big brother."

"My name is Theresa!"

Zuo Jian glanced at the girl beside him, and couldn't help but wonder if their encounter here was accidental or destined.

He could sense that she wasn't a fabricated image created in this space; this was the real Theresa, but she looked... as if she had truly returned to her past self.

Is this... reliving memories?

"By the way, Theresa, right?" Zuo Jian tentatively called out the other person's name.

"Um!"

"Hey, Theresa! Don't trust this guy too much, maybe he's just... cough cough." Theresis instinctively called out to her sister from Zuo Jian's back.

"Brother, but..."

"Your brother is right. And speaking of which, I seem to have noticed you've been staring at me since the beginning. Is there something on my face?" Zuo Jian glanced at Theresa beside him and asked curiously.

"Um... I'm not really sure... I just feel... a sense of familiarity."

"It's like... where should we have met before?"

Zuo Jian listening, Zuo Jian silently lowered his head, as if deep in thought.

"Big brother?"

"It's probably just an illusion. It just so happens that my face resembles someone you used to know," Zuo Jian said, shaking his head slightly. He then addressed Theresa was standing to the side.

"Also, you don't need to call me... big brother..."

"Don't instinctively trust strangers. Didn't your brother tell you that?" Zuo Jian sighed. To be honest, he didn't feel he deserved the title of "little sister" Theresa, who looked young but was actually older than all the people on his family's household registration. It just felt too strange.

"I already told her!" Theresis, on his back, expressed her dissatisfaction.

Although my younger sister is indeed a bit too kind sometimes,

After all, living in Kazdel, basic vigilance is certainly warranted.

But for some reason, facing this stranger...

"Zuo Jian, just call me Zuo Jian."

"Yes, Zuo Jian!"

Chapter Twenty-Nine, Brother and Sister (Part 1)

Call...

Behind the simple house, in a small courtyard filled with various wooden stakes, a young Sarkaz boy was swinging a perfectly straight wooden stick, as always, towards his target.